When You Can't Run No More
by x Bout as Stable as the Wind x
Summary: [AU] Denial. A bittersweet toxin that runs through you like a drug, one that creates a thin mask that mars reality. And its addicting. After all, being forced to grow up is one thing. RAISING a child to do the same is another. [Pan/OC]


Denial had never really been a problem for the immortal sprite of Neverland. Arrogance, mischievousness, selfishness, unlimited and the occasional **_demonic_** bouts of behavior were the main demons Peter Pan was known for expressing. What else could one really expect, though, from the son of the Dark One and the Queen of Hearts?

Still, even though time had no hold on the youth, it did not mean that **_change_** did not. He didn't have enough fingers to count on all the significant changes his life brought throughout – going from the boy hidden in the back room of the Wonderland palace to the boy who sat silently by his mother's side as she ordered heads to be chopped off one at a time or all in rows. Then he went from the silent boy to the Prince of Hearts, giving the orders himself. Then to the boy who desperately tried to hide his discovery of powerful magic he possessed, then the boy that failed that goal and become a miserable apprentice to his oppressive, cruel mother's teachings. Then the boy whom the Dark One came to collect; because, apparently, since he was Cora's first born, she **_owed_** Rumpelstiltskin his child as a part of a deal. Then the boy dragged to the Enchanted Forest, the boy who lived there a year before enlisting the aid of a pirate and a fairy to get him away from both parents for good, and then, finally, the boy who never grew up. The boy demon. The ever youth. A legend, a fairy tale, a sprite they said lived on a desolate, mystical island all on his own for centuries.

But then **_the_** change had occurred, when the Shadow – it had lived there before Pan had even arrived, and had soon attached itself to the boy whose own Shadow had been ripped away by Cora as a punishment one day – had decided that the boy king of Neverland had lived in solitude long enough. It brought along a companion that would remain, unlike the ghosts of children in the other realms that would visit during their dreams. It was a **_girl_** , surprisingly, and when she introduced herself, she called herself Leigh Rose Hunter Carson, from Misthaven, also known as the Enchanted Forest.

She then proceeded to hit him with a force surprisingly strong for someone her size, and she ran into the jungle.

He'd hated the Shadow for several months; for taking away the silence of the island, and for giving him a **_responsibility_** , and also risking ones **_other_** than Leigh Rose discovering the secret realm of Neverland. Eventually, though, over time, the initial loathing died down. The girl was blonde, his own age – perhaps a few months older, but then again Pan was immortal and thus would always be older anyways – and Neverland kept her from advancing any older. She had blue eyes like the ocean, but the fire in them was a stark contrast to their color. She picked out the little beauties along the island that Pan had always seen as unnecessary, irrelevant wastes; she lured out creatures to hold in her arms that Pan had always killed on sight with his magic. There was barely anything they had in common, Peter Pan and Leigh Rose, except for one aspect summed up in one word.

 ** _Lost_**.

Eventually, the plot of the Shadow's to give the immortal ruler of Neverland a companion went from hated to unwilling, unwilling to tolerated, tolerated to accepted, and then accepted to esteemed. All in a span of time that neither Pan nor Leigh Rose bothered to count.

So when a portal opened up from Wonderland and took Leigh Rose from the island that had adapted to her own presence the same as it had down with Pan, it was neither a surprise to her, the eternal youth, or the Shadow that he chased after her.

Wonderland. Cora. The Queen of Hearts handed the girl over to a mad man as a part of a contract, and he dubbed her 'Alice'. Pan arrived not over a day afterwards, and sought out a former ally, by the name of Jefferson. They found Leigh beneath the mad man's mansion, in the center of a maze. They found her and for three days they hid together in Wonderland with guards hunting, Jefferson keeping watch, and hiding in the cramped corners of a damp cave with her Pan couldn't bring himself to resist her when she pressed her lips to his own – not for the first time. But this time it led to something else, and for the first time since escaping to Neverland, the youth teetered on the brink of growing up and the never-ending, pleasant phase that comes before it. They found her; and after three days had passed, Leigh Rose collapsed.

They'd found her in a curse that not even the boy demon could break with the dark magic he'd been born with and grown in the jungles of Neverland.

"It's a powerful magic that can't be broken by others," Jefferson had stated.

"There has to be a way," the boy demon had replied simply, eyes narrowing. "And I'll find it."

There was a way. Jefferson solved it the next day.

"If you need to take the curse away and can't do it with magic, then just **_take all_** the magic away."

Pan lifted a brow, staring at him hard in the darkness of the Wonderland cave. "What do you mean?"

"You're not going to like this."

"I never like what comes out of your mouth. Tell me."

"Bring her a land without magic. **_The_** Land Without Magic. The curse won't work there."

"Land Without Magic? There's **_no_** magic there."

The Mad Hatter pursed his lips, sipping from his cup of tea. "I know."

"And I can't just **_leave her there alone_**."

"I know."

A pause. "There's **_no_** magic there," Pan repeated simply.

Jefferson finished his tea and set the cup down, looking the boy in the eyes.

"I know."

They both knew. When Pan picked the unconscious girl up and brought her over to Jefferson's portal he knew; and that was why, for the first time in his life, Peter Pan **_hesitated_** in his actions, felt **_reluctance_** in what he was doing, and felt, though he'd never use the word (it was a despicable form of weakness, after all), **_vulnerable_**.

When he stepped through the portal, all those sentiments overwhelmed him until he thought perhaps he'd passed out and was in a strange dream when he opened his eyes to Leigh still in his arms, and them both lying in the middle of an asphalt road painted with strange yellow and white lines, with queer buildings all around and a group of wide-eyed, curious strangers slowly walking over. Someone called for a woman called Emma, another called for a boy called Henry to stop approaching, and a loud-mouthed, shorter man with dark whiskers shouted for someone to see what a woman called Regina had done now.

Leigh Rose woke up a month later, opening her eyes to lacy white curtains and the warmth of a comforter thrown over a medical cot. There was a beeping machine thing next to her, and on the other side, a familiar lanky teenaged form half asleep in the uncomfortable chair. Pan looked at her the second her eyes opened, and when she asked what had happened, he told her a brief explanation, as brief as he could make it.

"Without magic?" she replied, brow furrowing as she suddenly searched him over. "None at all?"

"Not a drop. If you return to a land with it the curse will start back up and you will die. This was the only solution."

Leigh's eyes widened slightly as she reached up a hand to touch the side of his nearby face, the girl stiffening when she felt a prickling against her finger tips of a shadow over his lower face that had not existed at any point of their lives together. She gently felt the slight show of facial hair on Pan's face, then leaned back, staring at him in disbelief. "Peter…" she breathed. "You're going to…"

"I know, Leigh."

"But you're going to…"

"Yes."

"Peter."

"I **_know_** , Leigh. I'm going to grow up."

And he did. For the next two years, the sixteen-year-old immortal youth became an eighteen-year-old young man, without magic, without Neverland, without anything except the familiarity of Leigh Rose. He discovered Regina Mills and Neal Cassidy, discovered the Dark One had been in the small town (called Storybrooke, such a frivolous and pointless name, Pan found) before dying to save Neal – his second son, it turned out. And Regina Mills, the daughter of the Queen of Hearts. These were challenges and complications wrought throughout the former ever youth's new life in modern day Earth… but **_none_** compared to what happened December 24th of the second year.

Here was where the denial emerged unmasked and unhidden, surging through Peter Pan like a drug, a bittersweet toxin that created a thin mask to mar reality. It was **_addicting_**. After all, being forced to grow up was one thing; but being faced to **_raise a child_** to do the same was entirely another. _How_? It didn't seem possible. The denial had first cultivated nine months ago when it had all began but only now, sitting out in the hall of the of the small Storybrooke hospital on a plastic bench did the young man acknowledge the emotion's presence for the first time. _How, how, how, how,_ _ **how**_? It couldn't be real, it **_couldn't_**.

He wanted to wake up.

He sat there like a stone for several hours, watching nurses and that doctor man enter and exit the room; whenever the door opened he could hear Leigh's cries and the immortal youth had to force back a cringe. A **_cringe_**. Another sign of weakness that never once had Pan ever even **_considered_** allowing to show. It showed just how **_nothing_** he was without his magic, his powers, without what made him **_worth something_**.

Without Neverland he was back to nothing but some wandering **_lost boy_**.

And soon he wouldn't even be a boy.

There was a new, stranger sound coming from the room. Short, high-pitches cries, gurgling wails. After a few minutes of listening in slight confusion, he managed to put a name to that sound.

And without waiting another second Peter Pan **_ran_**. He tore out of the hospital, pushing past bewildered nurses and one Emma Swan that called out and tried to grab his arm. He easily shoved her away and continued, bolting out onto a street and turning down an alleyway in whatever direction his feet would carry him.

He'd always enjoyed running. And nowadays even more; it was as close as he'd ever come to flying again, after all. Out of habit, Pan closed his eyes – he knew this area by heart, after all, and knew few people ventured in this corner of the town – and focused on the cold wind that stung his face as his jacket flew out behind him and a light snowfall soon had his dirty blonde hair soaked. He was in sneakers; they slushed through snow and slid across ice but he never slowed. He wouldn't stop; not until he outran reality and outran **_time_** , until he'd escaped back into the past, back to **_Neverland_**. Neverland. It certainly wasn't the first time the teen had wished himself back there so hard till his head ached, but it was the first time Pan thought that if a portal opened up to the timeless realm he might just jump through alone and return home without even a **_second_** of hesitation.

Even without magic and without any powers whatsoever, he was still the boy demon, after all.

He ended up on Troll Bridge, and only then did Pan stop, gasping in oxygen to fill his burning lungs as he leaned forward with both hands on the railing, staring down at the frozen river below. It really wasn't a high bridge at all. Didn't even really qualify as a bridge whatsoever. People in this realm had such queer names for things…

"Do I need to worry about you jumping? I'll be honest, for a change, and said I never saw you as the type."

He couldn't help but give a quiet snort at the dry words; Pan didn't look up but the sound of heels clicking and the by-now-familiar voice told him enough who it was. He kept his gaze on the ground and ice below even as he replied, "Now since when does the **_Evil Queen_** worry about **_anything_**?"

He was fairly certain Regina rolled her eyes, though couldn't be 100% sure. Only when she was directly at his side, after all, did he bother glancing at her, dressed in a wool coat and red hat, dark eyes locked onto him. He remembered her expression when he'd claimed his parentage, and his own when she'd claimed hers. They certainly weren't close enough to be claimed as **_family_** – it was a word full of false hopes and lies, Pan felt – but still. They got along at the least.

"Miss Swan called me just a minute ago," stated the former Evil Queen, this time she was the one not looking at him, her gaze glancing at the iced-over river.

"And suddenly Swan is telepathic and can sense my whereabouts with a finger to her temple?" Pan replied dryly.

If one looked close enough they might've caught the slight smirk that twitched the corner of her lip's upwards. "Not quite," stated Regina. "This is all **_my_** ingenuity."

"Don't tell me it was womanly intuition."

"There's no magic here, doesn't mean I'm not left without any **_natural_** instincts," was the simple reply. There was a pause then, a rather long one as well, before Regina allowed herself to add, "Besides. I ran once too. When my mother was ready to marry me off and make me Queen."

Pan shook his head, a derisive sneer almost appearing. "That is nothing like this."

"Isn't it?" Regina challenged, lifting a perfectly combed eyebrow. "They're both responsibilities neither of us wanted. I was given the task of caring for an entire kingdom, and you've been given the task to care for…"

He cut her off. "You're insinuating we actually have something in **_common_** , Regina," he stated.

"Well." Regina straightened slightly, obviously thinking hard over her next words with a pursed set of lips, before continuing, "You **_are_** my brother. Halfway, at least."

Pan's own shoulders tensed slightly – two years was not enough time to clear away awkward air and that still small lingering amount of disbelief, not for the boy who time forgot – and he shook his head, but didn't reply.

She added on, "And, another thing in common with these two instances of running: they were don't for the same reason."

The young man clenched his jaw at that and he rolled his eyes, finding her completely mistaken. "You ran for the stable boy," he said in a tone that stated he was reminding her of something obvious and wasn't pleased at having to do so.

"And you ran because you think if you hide from the problem it will disappear," Regina stated matter-of-factly, and she went on before Pan could protest. "And you think if that disappears nothing between you and Leigh Rose will change."

"I don't_"

"You think that this new aspect in your relationship is going to put it in jeopardy_"

"You're not exactly an expert on relations_"

"_and over the past few months you've seen her affection for the child even before its born_"

"That **_does_** not have any_"

"_Leigh Rose is the only person who ever showed you the kind of affection that you see her giving to the child," Regina finished off, looking rather smug at successfully managing to keep the boy from arguing at all. "And thus, you feel threatened by it and are already partially jealous."

Pan adopted a look of utter indignation at that, and he scowled at her. "Are you trying to actually tell me that I am **_jealous_**? And of a **_newborn_** , at that?"

The smirk reappeared briefly. "It's a simple matter of natural emotions, Pan. We all have to accept them sooner or later. For you it **_does_** seem to be later, but that is better than never I suppose."

A scoff. "Let's pretend that your temporary bout of **_insanity_** actually makes a fraction of sense. You weren't **_jealous_** of Daniel."

"No." Suddenly Regina's facial masks slipped slightly, and she adopted almost (almost) a soft look; that look she would occasionally give Henry when he wasn't looking.

"No," she repeated. "I wasn't jealous of Daniel, I **_loved_** him. And you love Leigh." She finished off, as if that explained everything, and neither one bothered to say anything else.

Pan's mind was inclined to be angry at her accusations; though would that even make sense? He would be angry for the woman insinuating that he loved Leigh Rose? No. Because he **_did_** ; even though he never told anyone but the girl herself. Jealous of the child in her arms now, though… no. Peter Pan was not **_weak_** , he was not easily susceptible to something as pathetic as bloody emotions. It wasn't true, there were other answers. Fear of change? Fear was too strong a word; wary of change? Perhaps, he had to admit to himself.

He kept going, and by the middle of the mental interrogation of himself, he was frustrated. This was a game he could not win; which meant it wasn't a game at all. And no game meant there was no way for him to come out on top, to be victorious, to win.

Reasoning tried to remind him it meant he couldn't truly lose either.

The snow picked up. Pan didn't notice. His mind was back at the hospital, where Leigh was, where the infant in her arms was. Did she know he'd run yet? If so, she must be disappointed. She was not stupid for sure, and she was not blind. He'd done his best to be completely enthusiastic the past nine months but she could sense fear… **_no_** , he reminded himself, not fear, fear was too strong a word… she could sense **_caution_** , and that was the main emotion that wafted off of him like the energy of his magic used to. And she'd understood. And she'd still stayed with him, and tried to help him understand.

But he didn't understand. Not at all. "I wasn't meant to be this," Pan whispered aloud after a moment. "I wasn't meant to live here. Or grow up. Gain… whatever this is." Family? Friends? Allies? Companions? He didn't have a name for what certain people in the town had become. "And I most certainly was never meant to be a father."

Regina wasn't looking at him; that was no bother, Pan wasn't looking at her either. But he heard her nails tap against the metal railing in thought. "No one was really **_meant_** to be anyone," she bothered to offer. "Otherwise that would mean we were all part of a story." She chuckled slightly. "And we both know by now that this… reality, we're all a part of… is much more than that."

He knew that. It was the logic Regina Mills kept with her, the fact that nothing was destined, that fate was false, that life was made up as they went. Pan knew **_why_** she kept that belief as well.

Regina still wanted her happy ending; and Pan still wondered where was his.

He also wondered if he'd recognize it if it slapped him in the face.

With that thought, silence came over again; Pan blinked, and found himself not tense leaning over the railing anymore but simply standing looking out at the snow-covered forest. To the extent where he almost believed he was **_at ease_**.

Silence, for almost fifteen minutes straight.

Then Regina fixed her coat, smoothing it down, and shook some snow with distaste off her leather gloves. "Are you planning on staying out here until the child is an adult of its own and simply leaves town?" she inquired wryly.

"If I can't think of anything else," he tossed back.

Another beat of silence.

"Well then I'll leave you to that carefully thought out life strategy," she stated, slipping her hands into the pockets of her coat and taking a step back. She didn't look at him one last time, but immediately turned on her spiked heels and started walking away. Pan didn't move, or acknowledge her leaving.

She did pause at the end of the bridge though. He heard her command from where he was only a few feet away.

"Stop running, Peter."

Regina left Troll Bridge after that; ten minutes later, Pan pushed himself on the railing and did the same, going in the opposite direction, down the path he'd run through, and after a few minutes of silently walking, he reentered the hospital.

And Swan let him through. With a studious look but she didn't say anything as she stepped aside and let Pan into the hospital room. The lights were off, only a few warm nightlights on. The curtains drawn. The door was shut behind him, and Pan stood there, almost seeming frozen as he forced himself to look at the scene up ahead.

Leigh's gaze was already locked onto his own, turned away from the pink bundle in her arms, wrapped in a sterile white blanket. They simply stared at one another, before Pan finally took a few silent steps forward. He sat slowly on the edge of the bed near her.

Leigh didn't move. She kept watching him, searching for a real reaction. He couldn't bring himself to offer one just yet.

His gaze slowly flickered down to the bundle in her arms, and he saw real arms, a face, a mouth and a nose and ears and a headful of light, light hair the same blonde color as Leigh's. The infant yawned then, showing a tongue.

A child. All real.

The babe then opened its eyes. A shockingly bright emerald. A brilliant hue of green, just like his own.

Real.

The grandfather clock in the hospital lobby chimed twelve times. The snowfall was visible through the small crack between the curtains.

December 25th began.

Leigh's face finally showed a small change in expression; her lips moved as if they wanted to smile, but weren't sure yet. Her gaze never left her own. After a few more minutes, she whispered, "Merry Christmas, Peter."

Pan found he needed a moment or so to take his gaze off the child in her arms, and return to her face. "Merry Christmas," he replied, just as quiet as she was.

Her eyes shimmered a bit. The yellow light of the nightlight reflected in them.

"I love you."

He knew. And she knew his normal response.

"Me too."

Perhaps it sounded it tad obnoxious; but it had been his response the first time she uttered the words, and seeing how it took quite some work and length for him to say the actual three words, Leigh had settled for it easily.

A smile appeared briefly along her tulip shaped lips, but then faded.

"Peter." Her gaze caught his own once more, and grew an almost desperate quality.

"I love this child."

Silence for almost five minutes straight. A droplet rolled out the corner of her eye, and the infant's emerald eyes shut before he finally replied.

"Me too."

* * *

 _Leigh Rose Hunter Carson(c) is an OC owned by **theStarbucksofAncienceGreece**._

* * *

 **A/N: so, I promised this for Christmas and its late. :p but here it is! Really had no idea what to use as a plot so I just made up as I wrote, hope its satisfactory.**


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